Demographic characteristics and preferences of sport tourists in Iran

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

Abstract

Importance of sport tourism marketing as a field of study in sport tourism has emphasized now more than before. Firsr step in marketing is market segmentation and for this, information about characteristics and needs of customers are of special importance. Researches have shown that indexes like population, age clusters distribution, Income, sex, number of family members, spatial distribution of the population, amount of leisure time, ethnic group, education, activities, interests and attitudes, technical knowledge, buy and use behavior, expectations from product, consumption amount, and also place of residence will affect on tourism behavior and are criterias for market segmentation and selecting target markets. So the purpose of this study was to determine the demographic characteristics and preferences of sport tourists in Iran. The research method was descriptive. The sample of study consisted of 177 Iranian sport tourist and 125 foreigner sport tourists. A researcher-made questionnaire was used to collect the data (the validity was approved by experienced professors in sport management and its reliability was verified by Cronbachs alpha method, α=0/775). Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the data by SPSS software. The results showed that about 60 % of the samples were athlete and most of them were young (27 years in average) and male (%91). Most foreigner sport tourists had come from the neighbors countries to Iran. Although sport tourists had not good salaries, the money they tend to spent for the trip was nearly equal to their monthly income. Educational degree of most sport tourists (53 %) was diploma and lower. First interested area for sport tourism was "sea and other water activities" and first interested media for sport tourism ads was TV. The most important reason for sport tourists travelling was the sport event itself and the favorite season for them was spring. Results showed that sport tourists have specific characters which almost differ from other kind of tourists. So these special characteristics should be considered in planning for attracting them and a marketing planning which targeted on all kind of tourists, can not pull sport tourists to the event place.
 

Keywords

References

 احسانی، محمد؛ هنرور، افشار؛ افتخاری، رکن الدین؛ هنری، حبیب؛ جردن، فیونا. (1389). "تعیین عوامل مهم در کیفیت بسته های گردشگری ورزش در کشور "، نشریه مدیریت ورزشی "حرکت"، شماره 4، ص 5-26.
 ادبی فیروز جاه، جواد؛ کوزه چیان،  هاشم؛ احسانی، محمد. (1388). "بررسی مهم ترین جاذبه های طبیعی ورزشی موثر بر توسعه ی ورزشی کشور از دیدگاه کارشناسان ورزشی و گردشگری"، نشریه مدیریت ورزشی "حرکت"، شماره 1، ص 67-81.
 بلالی، مریم؛ معین فرد، محمد رضا؛ حامدی نیا، محمد رضا؛ امیر احمدی،‌ابولقاسم. (1389). "بررسی دیدگاه مدیران و کارشناسان در مورد توسعه صنعت گردشگری ورزشی در استان خراسان رضوی"، مجموعه مقالات همایش ملی مدیریت تربیت بدنی، ‌مرکز آموزشی و فرهنگی سما واحد قائم شهر، دی ماه 1389.
 تاج الدین، محمد باقر. (1388). "طراحی طرح آمارگیری از گردشگری ورودی"، گروه پژوهشی آمارهای اقتصادی ، پژوهشکده ی آمار دی ماه 88.
 تجاری، فرشاد؛ صفانیا، محمد علی؛ خلیلی،‌علی اصغر؛ دوستی، مرتضی؛ بیرق دار، فاطمه. (1389). "درک کیفیت خدمات، رضایتمندی و قصد بازگشت گردشگران به رویدادهای ورزشی"،  مجموعه مقالات همایش ملی مدیریت تربیت بدنی، ‌مرکز آموزشی و فرهنگی سما واحد قائم شهر، دی ماه 1389.
 حسن زاده، مهرداد.(1384). بازاریابی ورزشی، انتشارات پرسمان، تهران.
حیدر زاده، کامبیز. (1386). "توریسم ورزشی"، سازمان توسعه تجارت ایران معاونت بررسی بازار و بازاریابی.
 صردی ماهکان، علیرضا.(1380). بررسی نقش بازاریابی در صنعت جهانگردی شهرستان مقدس مشهد، پایان نامه کارشناسی ارشد، دانشگاه تربیت مدرس.
 گی، چاک وای. (1382). جهانگردی در چشم اندازی جامع. ترجمه: علی پارسائیان؛ سید محمد اعرابی، ویرایش دوم، 1382، تهران، دفتر پژوهش های فرهنگی.
 لاولاک، کریستوفر.، رایت، لارن. (1382). اصول بازاریابی و خدمات. ترجمه ابوالفضل (اردشیر) تاج زاده نمین، تهران، سازمان مطالعه و تدوین کتب علوم انسانی دانشگاه ها (سمت).
 معین فرد، محمدرضا. (1387). "وضعیت صنعت گردشگری ورزشی در ایران و ارائه الگوی توسعه آن". رساله دکتری، دانشگاه تربیت معلم تهران.
منابع لاتین:
Barros, Carlos Pestana. Butler, Richard. Correia, Antonia. (2010) . “The length of stay of golf tourism: A survival analysis”, Tourism Management, 31, PP: 13-27.
Braz, J.I. (2002). "Sport for all moves people around the globe: New perspective for tourism." Journal of Asiana Sport For All, Vol. 1, PP: 47-52.
Byon, K., Zhang, J., & Ko, Y. J. (2008). “Development of a scale measuring event sport tourism intention”. North American Society for Sport Management Conference (NASSM 2008), Toronto, Ontario, Retrieved January 27, 2009, from http://www.nassm.com/files/conf_abstracts/2008-451.pdf.
Cha, S., K. McCleary, and M. Uysal (1995). "Travel Motivations of Japanese Overseas Travelers: A Factor-Cluster Segmentation Approach." Journal of Travel Research, 34 (1), PP: 33-39.
Coshall , John T. & Charlesworth, Richard. (2011). “A management orientated approach to combination forecasting of tourism demand”, Tourism Management, 32 PP: 759-769.
Crawford, Duane W.; Jackson, Edgar L.; Godbey, Geoffrey (1991). "A hierarchial model of leisure constraints." Leisure Sciences, Vol 13, Issue 4, Oct-Des, PP: 309-320.
Department of Industry, Tourism, and Resources (2005). Niche Markets Overview. Retrieved August 20, 2005, from http://www.industry.gov.au/ content/itrInternet/cmscontent.cfm.
Ewert, A., & Hollenhorst, S. (1989). "Testing the adventure model: Empirical support for a model of risk recreation participation." Journal of Leisure Research, 21, PP:124–139.
Fourie, Johan & Santana-Gallego, María. (2011). “The impact of mega-sport events on tourist arrivals”, Tourism Management, xxx, PP: 1- 7.
Gibson, H. J. (1998a). "Active sport tourism: who participates?" Leisure Studies, 17, PP: 155-170.
Gibson, H.J.; Willming, C. & Holdnak, A. (2003) "Small-scale event sport tourism: Fans as tourists." Tourism Management, 24, PP: 181–190.
Hartzer, J. (1994). National Survey Shows Who''s Going to the Olympic Games and How They''ll Get There. Atlanta, GA: World Travel Partners.
Higham J. & Hinch T. (2002). "Tourism, sport and seasons: The challenges and potentials of overcoming seasonality in the sport and tourism sectors." Tourism Management 23, PP: 175–185.
Jackson E.L. (1993). "Recognizing patterns of leisure constraints: Result from alternative analysis." Journal of Leisure Research. Vol 25. PP:129-149.

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics